Subj : Re: "I hate the Lefties,
To   : Lee Lofaso
From : Jeff Thiele
Date : Tue Aug 16 2022 22:19:54

On 17 Aug 2022, Lee Lofaso said the following...
 LL> You forgot about the Boy Scouts, most favored group of Mormons.

I didn't include the Boy Scouts because I haven't heard of any current
scandals. That does not mean that there aren't any, though.

 LL> The real issue is not about Catholics, Baptists, Evangelicals,
 LL> Mormons, or any other religious group. Most religious folks are
 LL> not pedophiles, and condemn all acts of pedophilia as evil.

That is true, but enough of them are pedophiles to make those organizations
prime offenders. Also, the rank-and-file parishioners are typically not the
culprits; it is those who have authority and abuse that authority in an
organization that teaches its members from childhood that authority is not to
be questioned.

 LL> Why did you leave out the main group of pedophiles, who are not
 LL> religious at all? Folks such as public school teachers, for example.

These may seem like the largest group, but it's entirely possible that more
of them become public knowledge because school districts are not in the habit
of covering it up, as the religious authorities are wont to do.

 LL> You know as well as I do that the number of pedophiles in the
 LL> Catholic Church was always small, and should be non-existent today.
 LL> Yes, it is true Pope John Paul II did nothing to solve the problem
 LL> during his 26-year pontificate. And yes, it is true Pope Benedict
 LL> XVI did next to nothing during his short pontificate. But the new
 LL> kid on the block, Pope Francis, has shown his two predecessors
 LL> what to do, and has actually taken real steps to put an end to it.

I don't share your optimism. I think Pope Francis' efforts have been a decent
PR move for the Catholic church, but I'm not convinced that they made any
meaningful difference.

 LL> I expect Pope Francis to put the final nail in the coffin by
 LL> retiring, handing off the papacy to the laity, where it belongs.

Heh. Fat chance. There are currently 116 cardinal electors (including one
so-far-unnamed lucky one) with far too much to lose if that happened.

Jeff.

--- Mystic BBS v1.12 A46 2020/08/26 (Raspberry Pi/32)
 * Origin: Cold War Computing BBS (1:387/26)

.